Willow Matthews
"Embrace your dreams, don't dilly dally on the past..and..whatever happens, protect your honour as SOLDIER." - Willow Matthews - Episode Dylan Willow Matthews Design Willow Matthews is a 23-year-old woman by the time the series ends. In When wolves cry, it shows her start as a 1st class SOLDIER in Shinra's military at 16 years old yet she had joined the ranks 6 years prior to the events of Crisis Core. Willow Matthews is a blond-haired woman with emerald green eyes, she has a white skin tone and a pawprint birthmark on her left shoulder. she doesn't wear gloves and she has her hair up in a ponytail a majority of the time. Her SOLDIER design consists of a basic SOLDIER 1st class SOLDIER uniform with a wolf print on both shoulder pads. Her weapon is called the butterfly blade, symbolizing Willow's dream to make a difference. Story. Ahead When Willow Eilzabeth Matthews was born she was taken by her protector/older sister who was created to protect a now disbanded group named Spectre. As an attempt to protect the newborn baby that gave birth to her creation, Lyna Matthews who was origally called L9, took the newborn and ran out the town of Nibelheim, abandoninng their home and snuck onto a ship to flee the continant. 10 years later, Willow had been raised to believe that her name was Willow Elizabeth Matthews and she often sat outside the den she was raised in, often looking at the city of Midgar in the distance, wanting to make a difference in the world. As a result of this undying determination for her desire she left the den after a heated argument with her sister and left for Midgar. Once she arrived she was placed into the infantry to begin with. It wasn't until she met Zack Fair, A man she would later see as an older brother, that she accompanied him to the Shinra training room and it was here she met her mentor: Sephiroth and with a test to determine her skills, he took her under his wing, seeing her strength, finesse and techniques. After about 8 months of fighting in the wutai war she entered the SOLDIER ranks as a 3rd class SOLDIER and became the youngest SOLDIER in Shinra's history. She carried this title with pride and continued on as she normally had. On her 16th birthday, she ended up becoming a 1st class alongside her brother, proud of how far she'd come but of course..she would have been happier had the events that brought her to that point not been so painful. Once Willow had made it to 1st class, she met Cloud Strife, a young blond infantry man who had dreamed to be like the great Sephiroth, and their encounter wasn't your stereotypical meeting either. After a while the two had started dating and the two kept their relationship quiet. During this time she had also gone to the Church in the slums and met Aerith, her charge. By the time of the Nibelheim incident, Willow was around 2 months pregnant with a baby girl, only letting a few people know within her SOLDIER unit. On the 7th day, tragedy struck for Willow as she heard screaming and could smell smoke and as a result she bolted outside, not putting on her belt or her shoulder pads. She begged her mentor to stop his rampage only for him to turn around and stab her, causing her to miscarry her child. Dylan, her closest friend and ally, lifted her into his arms and glared at Sephiroth, demanding an explanation. Sephiroth just looked at him and turned around, walking through the flames. After seeing Sephiroth leave, Dylan gave chase and Willow slowly get back to her feet as her sister: Kira helped her up. Willow slowly made her way to the reactor but arrived too late. after telling Kira and Dylan to take Tifa and book it out of there, she entered inside only to collapse on the stairs with her boyfriend and adopted bother. Years pass by and nobody had heard from Willow, Zack or Cloud. that is until Zack breaks out and releases Willow and Cloud to reveal they were in some kind of laboratory. Willow, now drenched in pure mako energy, tells Zack to get cloud to his feet as they need to get out of Nibelhiem. Suggesting a fresh change of clothing, Willow finds what she can and they change out of their drenched clothing. After this, they take a breather and Zack remembers making a promise to Aerith, vowing to find a way back to her. Willow nods and vows to follow his lead. After several weeks of none travel and having a final encounter with Genesis, they finally make it back to Midgar..at a cost. Zack had Given his life to protect his sister and best friend. This article is a Work in progress.